After that bit of a scare yesterday, that we’d got our dates mixed up, we were up early and packed away for the ferry to Corfu.
Got a great piccie of the sea and campsite last night…
Elena’s Camping was fine for the night. Options for getting around would have been limited if we’d stayed longer, but it was only a few k’ from the port so worked well, especially as it was clean, had good WiFi and was only €31 for the night.
The signage to our ferry was a bit limited, but we assumed following the signs for Corfu would get us to the right ferry, so that’s what we followed.
We had print outs of our ticket confirmation, but not the actual the tickets. And It wasn’t at all obvious where we had to go to get them. So we pitched up at the port and parked randomly by some kiosks that looked like they might be the ticket offices and went and asked.
We were sent to a different kiosk than the one we selected, but it was the right place.
Having done this a couple of times it seems you get a barcoded ticket for each of the travellers plus another for the vehicle.
The ports on these crossings are bonkers. There’s a complete absence of any meaningful instruction on where you’re supposed to park and what you’re supposed to do. And worse than that, any advice we’ve been given seems to get contradicted by the next person we ask. For instance the guy at the ticket office in Igoumenitsa said lane 1. There was no lane 1. There were also two ferries leaving at the same time and vehicles for the two ferries just seemed to be intermingled on the dock, all jostling and driving around each other to board. I’m sure it sort of makes sense if you do it every day/week, but for noobies it was very confusing 🤷♂️
We’d been quite worried that we wouldn’t get on with the ticket we bought. We wanted to buy a 6m ticket, but there none available, so we bought a 5m ticket instead (this is vehicle length we’re talking about). We had got it in our heads that we’d offload the bikes and bike rack into the van if they were sticklers about the van length.
But for two reasons we don’t think it would have been a problem. Firstly, the ticket said >4.25m on it. Suggesting there was only one class of ticket above that length. Secondly, when you get to the port you realize nobody gives a flying f’ that you’re slightly over length.
As we sat on the dock it looked like there wasn’t going to be much room on the boat. But once inside all the cars just vanished to the back and there were just a few lorries to load.
So they could pack the cars as closely as possible, the ferry loaders got all the passengers to walk onto the boat, leaving just a driver. Meaning they only needed to worry about enough space for the driver to get out of the vehicle.
Once loaded we went and sat in the upper outside deck. There was a bar/cafe on the lower deck.
It was quite a pleasant hour and 45 minute crossing. Here’s a few piccies…
And then off to our apartment in Agios Gordios on the west coast of the island. The roads were quite alarming as we headed over the island. Narrow, busy, poor quality and hilly. But slowly does in the camper van and hopefully we won’t get into any trouble.
The apartment is off the “main” road, down a VERY steep incline and perched on the side of the hill overlooking the town.
Its’s one hell of a view down into the town!
We settled in, emptied the van (and especially the fridge that had been running for 5 weeks non-stop!).
Then went for a wander down a path to the side of the property to the right side of the bridge.
There seems to be a “pink” theme going on with some of the “resorts”!
We then sampled each of the small super markets in the town. Sue found some lactose free milk and we think Alex’s probably has the best selection of food rather than beach ware!
The water at the apartment isn’t drinkable, so we had to lug 6 x 1.5L pack of water back up the hill to the apartment.
We had Tuna pasta (lentil GF pasta) for tea and settled down for the evening, great sunset!
We failed miserably to get either of the aircon units to work. And a bug that Sue says was at least 50mm long (now called Morris) scuttled under the bed, not to be found. Neither of us are looking forward to him making an appearance tonight.
We’ll need to have a discussion about the air con tomorrow. But for tonight the apartment doors have good fly screens, so they’ll need to be used tonight.
Tomorrow our travelling companions arrive. We’ll spend a few days with them before they head home and we start to make our journey home again, but that’s at least 10 days away.
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